Pasifika Languages of Manukau

The Pasifika Languages of Manukau Project investigated the use of, and attitudes to, the four main Pasifika languages in Manukau — Tongan, Samoan, Niuean and Cook Island's Maori — with the intention of contributing to their maintenance.

Greetings in the four languages (full greetings available in the pdf documents).

The three-year project (2001-2003) was supported principally by a grant from the Marsden Fund and also by the Woolf Fisher Research Centre, The University of Auckland and Manukau Institute of Technology. The four languages were researched through interviews using a 27-page questionnaire.

In all 120 interviews were recorded with young, middle and older age groups, equal numbers of women and men, and representation of island- and NZ-born.

The questionnaire asked for:

demographic information

family history

language fluency

language use

language attitudes

issues of language maintenance.

Project findings

While the project showed that the Pasifika languages were currently in a relatively healthy condition, overall there was a clear trend indicated by many of the factors analysed which point to a shift away from the community language and towards English by these Pasifika groups.

This is evident particularly on related factors, such as language used to younger family members and differences between language use in interviewees' childhood homes compared with their current homes.

Indications were that there was a danger that these languages could be lost in the future if warning signs were not heeded to and appropriate measures adopted now.